An all encompassing equation of love

I started this blog because I wanted a space to express my ideas and make fun of my life. Eventually I fell in love with writing and this blog has been alive for almost 3 years now. But, as it is well documented in this blog itself, the love has been anything but constant. Even after repeated vows to blog regularly, I disappear into periods of emptiness. There would be 3 posts in draft mode, but I won't find a single word more to write! It is technically called a Writers block, but it is basically a lack of love. Now, will the same phenomenon happen when I am in love with a person as well? I don't know. There will be days, a lot many of them, when you feel like your better half means the world to you. But, will there be days when you realize that the world is majorly made of mud, dust, pollution and non-potable water? Being the engineer that I am, I cannot resist the temptation to ask this question.

Can love also be reduced to an equation, Love (t) = fn (t, 1/t, Sin t, Cos t), with 't' being the time variable?

Don't think my idea is outrageous. If numbers are allowed to be irrational, then why not this? Just imagine the possibilities. For a start, you can differentiate the equation and figure out the slope of your love curve! You will know when your love will maximise or minimise and you can act accordingly. You can integrate the equation between two time frames and find out exactly how much you will love a given person, correct to two decimal places. How simple would setting priorities become now? Excel will help you choose between marriage and career.

It does not come without a catch though. Mathematicians have a concept called 'indeterminable'. You can have an equation describing a quantity, but you cannot determine it. Mathematicians are cool, like that. What if we figure out the equation for love and then realize love, and therefore God, is indeterminable. I would rather prefer my God to be indeterminable. How about you?

An economist would agree that reality is not always morality. Even today, scientists around the world are talking about mapping a human being's past in terms of spatial and time coordinates (x, y, z & t). Their idea is, once you can zero down on a person's past through an equation, you can extrapolate that equation to determine his future. The only major problem they are facing is that the equation determining a person's past will change with every passing second and this will affect his future in a significant way. If they can find a way around it, astrology will simply be reduced to another excel sheet circulated in forward mails. Will humans ever get there? My guess is that God will let humans reach there and immediately press the 'self destruct' button for planet Earth. There is no plausible and logical counter to this argument. Will we get there in 2012? Give me a break...

Cheers!

An e mail to God

To:              God@universe.gov
Cc:              Heaven@universe.gov, Hell@universe.gov
Subject:      A humble request

Dear God

Hope this mail finds you in the best of your health and spirits!

I am told that everything happens for a reason and I could learn something worthwhile out of every painful situation. Currently, I have no idea about any of those stuff concerning my life. I request you to kindly let me know if there is something I need to know but failed to pick up.

I very well know you are not going to reply back through a comment on my blog. But now that I have told you, this becomes your problem, not mine.

Anticipating a favourable response from you.

Thanks and regards
Vasanth Kumar K
You know the crap that usually goes here after my name.

'Creative' thinking

Somebody once asked me why I am generally happier than the typical happy person around. I told her (or him, I just guessed guys won't ask me such questions) that is because I am greatly amused and amazed by the ways of the world and the world never ceases to interest me. One of the main reasons I am constantly amused is because, I think, in an acceptedly slightly crazy manner. These are not thoughts that will guide the course of next generation economy or solve global warming, these are simply useless thoughts.They don't serve any tangible purpose, nevertheless they are true! When I get a surging bout of creativity (aka craziness), I try to put it down on my blog. Reason 1, it gets documented for future generations to look up. Reason 2, it causes minimum damage, as only a statistically negligible percentage of humanity will ever stumble upon my blog. Now for the craziness, I mean, creativity...

When I was useless browsing the internet (I also usefully browse the internet), I stumbled upon a profession called 'creative writer'. Instantly there was a short circuit in my gray matter. Whenever some one writes, they create something, isn't it? It could be opinions, views, critique, novels, love letters or even shopping lists. They are creating something. So by definition of the process, anyone who ever wrote anything was a creative writer, isn't it? If someone is not creating something through their writing, they must be called copywriters. But doesn't copywriter mean something else? Here I am not debating upon the usefulness of the writing. On that basis, may be we can classify them as useful and useless writers. But that is a post for another day. Now, creating content and copying from others' content are all inclusive and mutually exclusive groups. In other words, if someone isn't creating content, they are copying it and vice versa. So creative writers and copywriters can very well be used to categorize all those people who write. Then for what do we use the word 'writer'? Is it a superset? Anyone?

Quite recently, I migrated my mobile number from a prepaid account to a postpaid account. Two hours after I had submitted the application, my coworker suddenly turned towards me. With a shocked expression on his face he said, "There is a buzzing sound coming from inside your head!". Yes, the damn thing inside was thinking. Again, prepaid and postpaid are two all inclusive, mutually exclusive categories. By conventional definition or by common perception, prepaid is when you pay before you use the service and postpaid is the other way around. Consider this, when the time reads 'post meridiem', it means after meridiem right? When your coworker says we will meet 'post lunch', you meet after lunch right? You also know what post mortem and post production mean right? By means of derived conclusion, 'post paid' means after the payment has been made right? No wait, that is prepaid!

Between the world and me, one of us is definitely crazy. I am just wondering which one!

I think thoda hatke, therefore I am thoda aur happy!

Cheers!

No comments...

No comments, this is what you say when you don't want to say whatever it is that you intend to say but want the listener to know what you are saying is not what you wanted to say. Alternatively, it is also what you say when you have absolutely no clue as to what you are supposed to say! Sometimes, it can be both. Sadly, this was not accepted as a valid answer to any of the questions in any of the (in)competitive exams in any phase of my life. Understandably so. Imagine a professor setting up a case study for a question paper - He googles and googles, scroughes through tons of pages in the internet, picks an esoteric case, translates it from Spanish (or Greek, or Latin, or Tamil) to English, spices it up with some numbers, (in an attempt to make it more difficult for geniuses like me to pass) draws up his own conclusions and just says, comment. In the answer sheet I write,

7. b)  No comments!  (fyi, this is a 15 mark question!)

I would have been long dead by now. Hey, do they have blogging in Hell? Not that I will end up in hell, I am just assuming they would have everything in Heaven (including Silk Smitha). Ah, crap! I do it again. Ever since I started this blog, I have made it a point to digress everytime I start to write. And you have been reading all these! I guess it has been a scientific art to keep this blog running and I am compelled to write a blog about it. Crap, digression again. Enough of it. Now I will get to my point. Everything you read from this point below has the breathtaking potential to miraculously waste 15 minutes of your life. Promise.

The primary purpose of this blog entry is to answer the quintessential question right at the center of the need for this blog's survival - Why don't people comment on my blog? It has become a serious concern. Let us talk numbers, take a look at the number of comments registered on my 3 latest blog posts - 8, 4, 1. Power series of 2 written backwards. Statistics would suggest the number of comments on this post would be 0.5. Seriously, God, why me?

Is it because nobody reads my blog? Couldn't be so... See, you are reading it. Gotcha! "If somebody is jobless enough to write crap, there is some-(more)-body else to enjoy reading that crap", once said Albert Einstein. Apparently that is how the Universe is designed. Promise. There are plenty of people who regularly tell me personally on gtalk that my last post was awesome. Are they cheating? Could be, they are my friends after all! I don't beleive in showing off by putting up visitor counters on my blog. I also don't believe the spelling of 'believe' is correct in the previous sentence. Obviously, it is the quality of readers that matters, not the quantity, no?

After careful, painstakingly detailled and horrendously boring analysis, I conclude Google might be the reason for the reduced comment traffic on my blog. They invented the Google reader. (No, I think they bought it from someone else, but that doesn't matter to this discussion). Everybody reads the unmatchable delivery of my hitherto unheard of intellect in their google readers and goes home. They don't come to my blog to comment. For the technically unequipped, it is similar to staying 1000 miles away from someone, calling them on phone and saying, 'I am still your boy friend!' You know, technology. Actually, I think this reason can be true. But I am not alone in this. Even the Hindu and the Times are battling to somehow get people to buy their newspapers. I just want you to leave lame comments on my blog.

From now on, if there are not enough comments on my blog, I will stop writing. Promise.

Alright... Regardless of whether you comment or not, I will write crap and you will read it. If you comment, I will write better crap. Comment and be a part of this legend of a blog. Offer valid only till stocks last. Conditions apply...

Cheers!

P.S - I know what comes to your mind after reading this blog entry. This has been conveniently titled to remind you that!

Universal wisdom from a Foreign return!

I should have written this long back. But because of some I.T. issues (my laptop screwed up), this got delayed for more than a week. So here it goes, universal wisdom from a foreign return!

I am now officially a foreigh return. Malaysia-check, Singapore-check. I could also see parts of Indonesia and Thailand from the aircraft. But I guess I am not allowed to check those! All those of you who are singing, "Sorgame endralum...", in the back of your heads, blog high 5! Long long ago, so long ago, I don't remember how long ago, somebody told me life is all about learning. You have to learn from anything and everything you do. Continual learning is the key to life. So here goes my 'learning' out of this 2 week long trip. Of course, I see the world with my own little sunglasses (and contact lenses). Therefore the forthcoming might cause some digestion related troubles if not taken with adequate amounts of salt... and pepper... and chat masala!

1. If you desperately want to be flying 35000 feet above the sea level in real inclement weather, you better be flying over the blue oceans rather than the brown sands. That way you can be sure you won't trasform into a spectular ball of fire when you get closest to the ground!
2. The range of business attire for women can fill a pocket dictionary. The range of business attire for men can fill two sentences... with difficulty!
3. The number of pages in the above mentioned dictionary is growing. If you have a problem with it and you are a guy, you will be booked under sexual harrasement and thrown out of the company. If you have a problem with it and you are a girl, go have some girl talk. Leave me alone!
4. If you are a vegetarian, India is your country. Hold it, praise it, fall in love with it, don't you bloody leave it. According to some 'reliable' sources I have, even cows abroad are planning to abandon eating grass!
5. Rest of the world sees us an 'Indians' and we are expected to behave as 'Indians'. Insert your favourite sentence about unity in diversity here.
6. It might be a good idea to determine what is the 'Indian archetype' in all the walks of everyday life. For instance, if somebody asks you to write their name in Indian language, don't ask 'Which one?' Or if someone asks, 'Do you do this in India?', in all probabilities, refrain from answering, 'We do, they don't'. Ain't cool bro!
7. It is not such a great idea to come back and tell your friends back home that in KL, you discovered you were most suited to be a driver! Confused? Never mind!
8. What happens outside India, stays outside India. For instance, don't come back and tell dad that you want 3 wives because some part of the world still believes we Indians are allowed that luxury! And seriously, who told them that it is a luxury to have 3 wives?
9. Finaly, Sorgame endralum... adhu namma oora pola varuma... Yes, I had to say it!

If you have something to add, please do it in the comments section.
Cheers!

Thirai Kadhai (Screenplay)

Disclaimer: Non Tams, this blog post might be similar to watching a Tam movie with English subtitles! Kindly adjust!

Metti Oli... No, don't run. It is definitely off air now, even the rerun. Metti Oli, literally transliterates to 'toe ring sound' in English. Wow, right? How the hell in this world does one listen to that, you ask? Me too, same sentiment! I would like to describe this serial like this. My mom started watching this, got enough of it, stopped watching it, started missing it, started watching it again, got enough of it again, stopped watching it again, started missing it again, started watching it AGAIN and, trust me, Devayani (Abi) was still trying to figure out whom to marry! I was like, 'Andava...! Thanni adichitu flat ayitiya...!'. Even if this were telecast in heaven, I guess our lady gods would have been glued to it. Mudiyala da sami!

On a separate note, I saw a serial in which this Vadivukkarasi aunty was speaking a in male voice! I was... well... umm... errr... Speechless!

Well yeah, the screenplay. I wonder why they even write it. Not this blog, I am talking about the screenplay. This blog occupies a truly indispensable position in today's society. When I was trying to draw a parallel to our serials' screenplay, the best I could find was running on a treadmill. You start running, you warm up, you keep running, you sweat, you get tired, you keep running, you are exhausted, ippave kanna kattudhe, you fall down, the machine throws you out and what the hell, you are still exactly where you started! So much of time, energy and effort wasted and only slight, minute, frustratingly small movement forward. These days they are taking small serial breaks in between commercial advertisements. My Mom usually says, "rendadhu break la tea potu tharen!" (I will make tea during the second break!). Just imagine, you can make tea for a family of four during a commercial break! Then there is this idhu varai, recap! A bloody brilliant contrivance to eliminate the need to write screenplay. Here is how it works, you show nothing today, then you show the same nothing again tomorrow! Dude, how much am I going to forget in one day? You know how much my boss expects me to remember? Your honor, as seen by the arguments stated above, screenplay for a Tamil serial is unnecessary and practically tough to find! Hence proved!

Having already established that screenplay is practically non-existent in our serials, we proceed to explore some integral characters that form the cogs on which the screenplay moves. Note to self - The last sentence was so awesomely confusing. Don't write again while watching Tamil serials. Despite all these distractions, our Thai kulam (noun, literal meaning - Mother clan, the versatility of this noun being that you can even use it on girls who are yet to be mothers, even your neighborhood one year old huggies sporting female toddler) somehow manages to grasp what is happening in the little screen! Lady gods' gift, probably!

The center of the universe for any serial is the protaganist also known as problem magnet. Somehow all the problems in the world seem to find their way to the problem magnet and the problem stream never dries up. It helps enormously if this character is a lady. Next important character in our serial is the eternal villain. He is the source of all the troubles that our problem magnet faces. He is entirely responsible for getting the protaganist the sympathtic votes from the audience. Even Osama Bin Laden may one day start talking about peace but this character is not going to stop creating troubles for the problem magnet, even after the serial ends, they just stop showing it on TV. It helps enormously if the eternal villain is a relative of the problem magnet. That way it is easier to create troubles and sympathy! This is where I am tempted to define the law of conservation of problems as a limiting case to Tamil serials - Problems can neither be created nor be destroyed. They can only be transferred from the villain to the protaganist. The number of problems in a Tamil serial always remains a constant. There is a considerable loss that happens when the problems are getting transferred and this loss is recreated as sympathy on the part of the audience. Eppudi?

Other than these main characters, you have this aiyo pavam (noun, meaning poor, character wise, not monetary wise) character. More often that not, this hapens to be the problem attracting protaganist. But if need be, it can also be designed as an orphaned child, drunkard brother, studious sister from a poor family etc. These characters are made to face pain for no fault of theirs, true to their category. Finally you have the all-in-all-alaguraja (noun, meaning I-know-it-all) character. These characters generally poke their nose into unnecessary issues, usually get things wrong and end up giving not at all useful advice at completely uncalled for situations! Then if you really want to complicate things and if you have enough budget, you can add any number of items from your grand Indian family tree. A typical Tamil serial would have a family tree problem so huge that you won't be able to solve it in CAT even if given the entire 2.5 hours! This way you can inadverdently prolong the serial from ice age 4 to ice age 6, without any screenplay, that is the important point.

For those of you who still have some place left for me in your hearts, the Malaria virus is off me and I am back to business in Bombay. Although I am still recuperating. But even the fact that I am in no way vulnerable to Tamil serials now is not going to stop me from continuing this series. Naan oru tharava mudivu panniten... sari venam vudu... After spending the last two weeks at home, I am convinced that I will have to do a piece of the audience as well. What an involvement they exhibit! Oh yeah, enjoy the insanity as long as it lasts!

...thodarum
(to be continued)

Kadhai (Story)

Chithiiiiii (with 6 'i's).... For those acquainted enough with the Tamil silver screen, this word is a legend (for few others its a terror!). It was one of THE Tamil serials that was aired during, well, most of my schooling. Quarterly ended, half yearly ended, annually ended, even school ended but Chithiiiiii did not! Half of TN did not believe it could end. Most housewives truly believed the world would end the day Chithiiiiii ended. Such was the legend. Alas, even Dumbledore had to die, you know. You ask me about life after Chithiiiiii? Pretty much the same. Chithi illana oru chithappa, namma pozhappu adhe dhan pa! Dear non-Tam audience reading my blog, kindly condone the overwhelming Tam influence in this particular series of posts. After all, we are dealing with Tamil serials here.

Now that I am home and I am grounded, I get to watch a lot of Tamil serials. Yeah, one for each flavor! No, it has not been easy at all. So I decided to take notes and do some analysis. Note to self: Six years of school and six years of college without so much as a page of notes and now you are taking notes on Tamil serials, gosh! Anyways, getting back to my analysis, I decided to carefully deconstruct each and every aspect and demystify the esoteric obscurity called Tamil serial. In a series of ensuing posts, I am going to handle one facet of Tamil serial that is true to itself. Therefore, ladies, skip the next sentence. Gents, buckle up, we are dealing with truck loads of crap here!

The first facet we are considering here is the most indispensable part of any serial - Kadhai aka story. If stories are what movies are based on, then, logically, I am bound to think that a serial must be based on a novel, volumes of it actually! But this is where we are distancing ourselves as far away from truth as possible. A Tamil serial is generally based on stories that are one sentence long. Or should I be saying one sentence short? There exists an unwritten relationship between the longevity of a serial and the story it is based on - the longer you want the darn thing to run, the shorter the story you must be attempting! You remember in school you used to do this - once a chewing gum had lost its chew-ability, you used your hand to pull it as long as possible and then chew it back and then pull it again? Chee... Ovak... Disgusting, right? That is exactly what they do with our Tamil serial stories!

These guys are smart in one respect though. If you restrict yourself so much as to a story, you are reducing the scope of creativity! You heard it right, creativity. So our people base the serials on broader themes which are easier to twist, turn, manipulate and even start all over again. These themes are generally poignantly peaceful and completely family oriented. One would want their kids to imbibe all the portrayal and emulate them in real life. That would way the kids would have really meaningful lives. Typical Tamil serial themes include rendu pondati karan (bigamous husband), odukali pondati (run away bride, no no, run away wife), mamiyar-marumagal prechanai (saas-bahu episodes), sakkalathi sandai (bahu-bahu episodes), varumai kottuku irandu mile keezhe vazhkai (abject wretched destitution), theerpu sollum nattamai (your friendly next door chief justice of India for the village) and other such jolly good items. Things get really really hazy when these themes mix, match, metamorph, mangle and finally mutate. Are you still worried about your audience? Never mind, they never seem to care!

So much to the story and we have just seen the tip of the iceberg. We will slowly uncover and thereby discover various breathtaking facts and mannerisms of the quintessential Tamil serial as we gather more and more courage. I will also reintroduce to you one legend of a Tamil serial that ought to be remembered in the beginning of every post. More insightful and not-at-all tongue-in-cheek articles about screenplay, star cast, music and other such truly exciting facets of Tamil serials in the making. Enjoy the insanity as long as it lasts...

...thodarum
(to be continued)